A good training program is vital to helping zoos take care of their charges. While most people think of ‘exotic animal training’ as the whips and chains immortalized in old images, modern zoos have chosen voluntary, reward-based training methods that make training sessions some of the most enriching parts of an animal’s day.

Sometimes, when you visit a zoo, there’s seemly random stuff in the exhibits for animals to interact with: these “toys” given to the animals are part of a carefully structured program that keeps animals active and engaged. 

One of the things that makes it hard for visitors to a zoological facility to understand how things work is the fact that there's a lot of field-specific lingo - here's a glossary of common terms. 

A facility’s accreditation status tells you a lot of information about aspects of the organization you can’t normally see or access as a guest.